


In Which Taako is Alone (but not really)

by smile_for_me



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Barry needs a hug, Episode: e060-066 The Stolen Century Parts 1-7, Everyone Needs A Hug, Found Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, References to Depression, Taako Needs A Hug, Temporary Character Death, because it's stolen century, i just wanted barry and taako to be friends, it's fine, so it's fine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 19:35:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13301757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smile_for_me/pseuds/smile_for_me
Summary: The trek back up the mountain isn’t too long, but with the sound of Lup’s dying fresh in his ears, it feels like ages to Taako because even though Magnus is following his steps up the mountain he’s missing something and he’s alone he’s alone he’s alone.(basically, lup dies and taako's lonely, but he and barry get through it together)





	In Which Taako is Alone (but not really)

**Author's Note:**

> not beta read because i haven't convinced my beta to listen to taz quite yet! this is also the first thing i've written for taz and i'm not entirely sure about some of the characterizations here so... all mistakes are my own (also some of the spacing is weird and idk why i'm sorry)

It’s a few cycles after the Legato Conservatory—after Lup and Barry talked—and it it’s fucking awful. Merle went within the first week, anxious to talk with the Hunger, and entered Parley as soon as they sort of got the lay of the land. They’re all fairly used to Merle doing this by now, but it doesn’t make it any easier to stand around him and wait, knowing he probably won’t be waking up from his meditative state but still hoping desperately that this would be the successful time.

 

The lay of the land sucks, too, namely the weather. Everywhere they go, the sky is covered in rain clouds, the air is constantly moist. When they fly over the sea, it’s clear there would never be favorable conditions for any seafaring vessel. The land, which covered only a small part of the plane, is covered in a thick layer of trees most likely hiding an incredible amount of wildlife beneath them. Taako decides he hates this plane on the first day when the feeling of dampness on his skin doesn’t fade even in his cabin in the Starblaster. His hair is destined to be a frizzy mess for the rest of the year—something he complains to Lup about for hours that first week. 

 

Then it gets worse. 

 

When the Light lands, they see it go down a ways away from their location at the top of one of the only mountains in this world. After some calculations from Lucretia and Barry, Lup, Magnus, and Taako head out to do some intel-gathering about the rainforest and maybe retrieve the Light if conditions are favorable. They’re all more cautious than usual—like they tend to be when they’re left without their cleric—but it still goes to shit pretty quickly. Conditions are definitely not favorable. 

 

They make it down the mountain fairly easily, Taako putting in some grumbling about the weather and the cold and hanging back a few steps behind Magnus who is a few strides behind Lup. When they reach the base of the mountain, it isn’t clear that anything’s up. There are a few scattered trees that thickened the further they go in, blocking the meager light the sky offered fairly quickly. They go on for a few yards—Taako and Lup able to see with their darkvision with Magnus sandwiched between them—before Magnus asks them for some light with their wizarding abilities. Lup immediately complies, conjuring up a cluster of flame in her palm that floods the area with light. And that’s when things really go wrong.

 

They weren’t able to discern any sort of animals in the forest, but they assumed there would be some. They weren’t expecting anything like this. 

 

As soon as Lup puts up the light, she is engulfed in a swarm of white specks that seem to devour her. She screams in pain and to Taako it feels like an eternity of watching her be destroyed by whatever creature it is, of listening to her shrieks of agony. He is frozen and can’t move even when Magnus—quick on his feet as always—turns and yells at him to go. 

 

Lup’s screaming stops and Taako can see the specks drifting toward them, can start to feel some burning sensations on his arms. Magnus is yelling at him, but Taako can’t hear him—the sounds of his sister’s shrieks echoing in his mind. He can’t even see Lup’s body as Magnus grabs him and runs in the direction they came. As soon as they are out of the abrupt darkness of the forest, the specks stop, unable to enter the clearing for some reason. Magnus keeps running until they’re at the base of the mountain, holding Taako close to his chest for a long moment. Taako can hear Magnus’s chest-heaving breaths and loud heartbeats from adrenaline, but Taako feels numb. The whole ordeal only took a handful of seconds, so the shock still has a firm hold on him. 

 

He blinks when Magnus pulls away from him after an indeterminate amount of time and meets his friend’s eyes. After a moment, he can feel the ever-present rain dropping onto his skin cooling the splashes of burnt skin on his arms, can hear Magnus talking to him. 

 

“Taako? Taako, hey. Taako.”

 

He’s probably been saying his name for a couple seconds judging by the tone of his voice, but it still takes Taako a moment longer to respond.

 

“Yeah, my dude?” he finally says, and his voice sounds too airy, too breathless. 

 

Magnus breaths out a sigh, relief clear on his face once the wizard responds. “You okay?” he asks, and his voice is hushed but it’s still almost too loud to Taako, and he realizes they’re still standing too close together and his hands are still kind of on Magnus’s chest as a remnant of being carried out of the forest and subsequently held by him. 

 

“Peachy,” he answers as he moves away, schooling his expression as he turns around and moves toward the mountain. “Come on, we have to tell everyone about those things.”

 

The trek back up the mountain isn’t too long, but with the sound of Lup’s dying fresh in his ears, it feels like ages to Taako because even though Magnus is following his steps up the mountain he’s missing something and he’s alone he’s alone _he’s alone_.

 

Lucretia, Davenport, and Barry are waiting for them in the hull of the Starblaster, and Taako watches as their faces fall in unison when they realize only the two of them have returned. Naturally, Barry is the one to ask. 

 

“Lup?” he says, looking straight at Taako. Taako doesn’t react, just looks back at Barry, feeling three other pairs of eyes on him for a second before Magnus clears his thought and shakes his head. Davenport asks what happened and Magnus starts to tell them, but their voices sound muffled to Taako because Barry is still staring at him and he can see a bit of the crushing feeling in his chest reflecting in the human’s eyes. He stares back for another long moment as Magnus speaks and Lucretia transcribes, but then turns and leaves, letting the door to his room shut loudly behind him. 

 

***

 

No one really talks about it. 

 

Barry and Lucretia spend their time trying to figure out the white specks inhabiting the forest, Magnus spends the year honing his woodworking skills—namely by setting out to build a table for the ship’s tiny kitchen when it becomes clear they’ll need it, and Davenport works with Taako and his Transmutation magic to keep their supplies stocked. It frustrates Taako to no end because no one seems to _care_. Sure, Merle and Lup will be back at the beginning of the next cycle, but Taako sees the image of his sister being devoured whenever he closes his eyes, hears her shrieks of pain in every silence. Elves don’t need sleep, but Taako likes to at least get in a few hours of meditation every night. After the first few tries of being alone with his thoughts, he resigns himself to a restless year and spends the spare time cooking or working on his Transmutation. 

 

It’s about two months into the cycle when Taako’s able to absorb his surroundings a bit more and stop himself from feeling as disconnected. On one of his nights spent wandering, he notices light and sounds coming from the lab. After a quick cast of Clairvoyance, he sees Barry inside, working on something, and it’s pretty clear that the human hasn’t been faring much better than him with rest. Taako can’t remember Barry coming to get dinner, or even lunch that day and finds himself in the kitchen, putting together a sandwich from the leftovers before coming back. 

 

He tells himself he’s only doing this for Lup, that his sister would kill him if he let her boyfriend waste away because she kicked it early in a cycle. For a second, he stands in front of the door and reconsiders his decision before knocking and letting himself in. 

 

Barry looks up from his work in surprise but relaxes when he sees Taako, expression morphing into confusion instead. 

 

“Hey, Taako,” he says, but there’s a question in his voice, asking why he’s there. 

 

“Hey, my dude. Didn’t see you today. Figured you could use some food,” Taako replies, not really meeting his eyes, holding up the plate before setting it down on an empty space on the table Barry’s at. 

 

“Oh. Thanks,” the human replies, and Taako waves it off, already leaving the room. 

 

“Don’t mention it.”

 

***

 

That’s how it goes for a while, Taako dropping off food in Barry’s lab a couple times a day to make sure he’s remembering to eat. After some time, he starts to stay and eat with him, preferring Barry’s quiet muttering and distracted half-conversations to the others’ worried looks and awkward, forced pleasantries around him. 

 

Even though they don’t talk much, by six months into the cycle, Taako and Barry spend most of their time with each other. Taako hangs out in Barry’s lab, practicing Transmutation or meditating—because for some reason Barry’s presence is enough to calm his incessant need for _Lup_ and shuts his mind up most of the time. Little by little, Barry starts to follow him to the kitchen when he cooks, eventually finding himself following Taako’s instructions for some of the simpler parts of the recipes instead of sitting and watching. They exist together in relative silence for the most part, working on their own things in the same vicinity of each other.

 

It’s late one night and Taako’s immersed in some Transmutation practice, seeing how far he can push an object past its original state, when Barry speaks up. 

 

“Hey Taako?” he asks and the wizard glances over to see him sat up from where he had been hunched over some sample from Magnus’s last venture outside—even being careful to avoid going completely under the blanket of trees, there were apparently still many other forms of life and nature to study, not that Taako had been outside recently.

 

“Yeah, Bluejeans?” he answers before looking back to the block of solid wood in front of him and muttering a spell to watch it turn to metal. 

 

“You know those cookies Lup always makes?”

 

Taako freezes halfway through his next spell and watches as the block falls into little pieces of metal and glass. 

 

“The butterscotch ones?” he asks, a little hesitant. 

 

“Yeah,” Barry answers, looking at him now. “You think we could make some?”

 

Taako pauses for a second, hands tugging on the cuffs of Lup’s sweater he stole a few weeks ago and then imagining her whiny complaints about him stretching them out and stopping. “They are good cookies,” he says and he sounds maybe a little dazed. 

 

“Yeah,” Barry agrees, and he’s setting down his stuff now, pushing his glasses up his nose in the most-dorky, most-Barry way possible. “And they kind smell like her.”

 

“Yeah,” Taako echoes, and his still looking off into the distance somewhere. He must be quiet for a while because Barry says his name and when Taako jolts out of the weird headspace, the human is standing directly in front of him, looking vaguely concerned. Normally a look like that would be enough to have Taako glaring, saying something about not being made of glass, but from Barry, it’s somehow different. It’s not about pity like the looks he receives from Magnus and Lucretia and Davenport that are a mix between pity and sadness at seeing him alone, all of them being unusually nice to him like he can’t function without his sister. And yeah, without Lup he’s incomplete in a way he can’t put into words, but he’s still a fucking talented wizard in his own right. He made it into the IPRE, onto the Starblaster on his own merit, separate from Lup because _he_ _deserves_ to be here and he’s not some invalid just because his twin isn’t here.

 

The look Barry gives him isn’t that. Barry—who hasn’t treated him any differently than if Lup were here, who has never been anything but unfalteringly kind to Taako even when Taako has done nothing to deserve or reciprocate the feeling because that’s just how he is—looks at him with the determined sort of sadness Taako has felt like a weight in his gut since he watched his sister disappear. It reminds Taako of Lup, always the optimist of the two of them, grabbing his shoulders in their younger years when he said something particularly nihilistic and firmly reminding him with unflinching certainty that they would make it past this. That they would work while the could and run when they must and they would hold out as long as they needed. Barry looks at him and Taako knows he’s not entirely alone in this deep pit he’s constantly trying to claw his way out of. He’s reminded for a second that shit does matter, that, like it or not, this gawky, steadfast genius is his family and he’s hurting too and Taako feels a flood of something like compassion—and that must be Lup’s influence—for Barry fill his stomach and almost sees what it must be like for Lup to love him. 

 

“They are fucking good cookies,” he repeats and Barry looks a little relieved that he’s said something. “Yeah, let’s make some of Lulu’s faves.”

 

They don’t have all of the ingredients, but Taako has enough spell slots left to turn the white sugar into the dark brown that they need, and the chocolate chips into butterscotch. Barry stirs while Taako instructs and they’re both feeling a little sappy and beyond exhausted as they bake so the pair breaks into Merle’s ‘secret’ stash and passes a bottle back and forth while they swap dumb stories from their childhoods. 

 

They’re in their respective rooms when their teammates wake up the next morning, the only remnant of their night being the plate of cookies left on the small table Magnus made for their kitchen a few weeks ago. 

 

***

 

About eight months in, Barry starts to venture outside of the warmth of the Starblaster in search of more specific samples of plants and whatever else he’s trying to study. Magnus usually accompanies him because no one seems to really want to leave Barry or Taako alone. They seemed to have gotten a little more paranoid than before now that the two of them can usually be found with each other because for some reason that translates into them being more fragile than if they were both alone. 

 

With his new and extensive samples to work with, Barry seems to be working harder than ever, spending long hours where Lucretia joins them in the lab to document everything Barry’s learned about the general flora of the plane and explaining everything he’s figured out about the spores that took Lup. For the most part, Taako sits in his corner of the small room and only vaguely listens to their nerd chatter, but his ears do twitch in their direction whenever they talk about the spores which they’ve dubbed scorching spores. He’s working harder than Taako’s ever noticed before, spending most of the day outside in the cold and wet, wandering around the face of the mountain and then spending the night running tests and calculations. Often when Taako comes out of his few hours of meditation at night, he finds Barry in the same position he was before he slipped away. 

 

After a few weeks of that, it really shouldn’t be a surprise to Taako when Barry wanders into the kitchen one morning looking decidedly worse for wear. Taako watches quietly over his mug of Merle’s favorite tea—because it was good, alright, not because he missed the doof—as Barry pours himself a cup of fantasy coffee, almost dropping the carafe when he’s taken by a fit of coughing that has him grabbing onto the counter for support. Raising an eyebrow, Taako watches as the human raises himself again and sets down the fantasy coffee pot, proceeding to pour some sugar into his mug and sniffling a little. As Taako’s trying to think of what to say, the timer for his quiche dings and he retrieves it from the oven, pleased with the way it’s turned out. 

 

“You hungry, Barold?” he asks, turning to look at Barry who is looking at him now and Taako feels something clench in his chest because his glasses are a little crooked and behind them his eyes are glazed over, cheeks red with the force of the fever that’s obviously got a hold of him. 

 

Barry opens his mouth to answer, but then he’s coughing again and Taako has to step forward and take hold of his mug with one hand, his shoulder with the other, and he can feel the stupid, concerned expression on his face as Barry gets a hold of himself and makes a little whining, groaning noise.

 

“Not really,” he answers weakly and his forehead has fallen against Taako’s shoulder and the wizard can feel the uncomfortable heat radiating off of him and he _doesn’t know what to do_. He’s never been the caring. type, never been the one the crew goes to when they’re not feeling well, but he doesn’t know where anyone else is and Barry definitely needs to be in bed right now and it looks like the responsibility of getting him there is falling on Taako. 

 

The panic is rising in his throat and for the life of him, Taako can’t speak, can’t move, can’t think and Barry’s kinda slumped against him and, gods, it’s just how Lup slumps against him when she’s complaining about something and he _misses_ Lup _he_ _needs Lup._ His mind stops for a second. Lup. Yes, Lup, that’s what he needs. He needs to think like Lup. What would Lup do? Suddenly, his sister’s voice is in his head, saying something vaguely threatening about how he better not let Barry die from some _cold_ just because she’s not there and they’re missing their cleric. Of course, that’s not much help telling him how to take care of Barry, but at least it urges him to do _something_. 

 

“I think you better get to bed, my man,” he says, and maybe his voice is a little… _less_ than normal but at least he’s said something. 

 

Barry stays still for a second, and Taako almost thinks he’s not gonna move, but then he coughs a little and nods, picking himself up. “Yeah,” he agrees, and he looks a little downtrodden as he shuffles away. Taako follows a second later, going just far enough to watch him stumble into his cabin, telling himself it’s just to make sure he doesn’t go back to the lab. 

 

He watches for a couple more seconds before turning back into the kitchen and moving the still-warm quiche onto the kitchen table to clear up enough space for what he needs. 

 

***

 

The soup’s ready by early afternoon and it’s pretty fucking good even if Lup’s always been better at soups for whatever reason. Magnus, Lucretia, and Davenport are all already in the kitchen, sitting on the benches Magnus finished a couple weeks ago. They were drawn into the kitchen at least an hour ago by the smells coming from the large pot Taako’s got simmering, and they all sing his praises when he finally dishes them up a serving and for another half hour or so, it feels normal because no one’s giving him Looks and they’re all just talking. They decide that Taako should take the lead with Barry so as to avoid anyone else catching whatever illness he’s contracted, and Taako agrees begrudgingly even though they all sort of knew he wouldn’t let anyone else do it without Lup here. 

 

He dishes up a bowl of soup and gets a glass of water before going down the narrow hallway to his cabin. Knocking quietly, he lets himself in and immediately wishes he had something more to offer, but they had squandered their meager supply of healing potions a month ago when Magnus and Dan had lost some hit points off of some tree they were chopping down for firewood and Maggie’s projects and Taako had looked through all of their supplies for anything, but nothing had come up.

 

Barry is curled up in his bed, looking probably-worse than when Taako had seen him that morning. He’s not wearing his glasses so when his eyes blink open and turn toward Taako they’re wide and unfocused.

 

“Taako?” he asks through a cough as he pushes himself up. 

 

“Hey, my dude,” Taako answers as he steps inside. “I brought this,” he adds and holds the soup and the water out to him. Barry kinda stares at him for a second, probably processing the whole situation with his fever-addled mind, before accepting the glass of water with shaking hands. He drains about half of it before setting it down on the little nightstand next to some hair pins and bands that are obviously Lup’s. 

 

Taako’s chest aches looking at them, but luckily his attention is drawn back to Barry when the man says, “Thanks.” When Taako looks, Barry’s looking at him with sleepy eyes and Taako’s really not used to seeing him without his glasses on, he looks too open and vulnerable and Taako thinks he understands a little more of Lup’s love for the man in front of him. 

 

“Don’t mention it,” he says, maybe a couple seconds late, and carefully pushes the bowl into his now-empty hands. “Eat some of that, then you should probably go back to sleep.” He sort of stands there awkwardly for a moment before he notices the way Barry sort of has his head angled downward but his eyes looking off into the distance somewhere at the top of his line of sight and recognizes it as him feeling uncomfortable. Taako kinda sighs to himself and moves to sit down on the bed with him, trying to pinpoint exactly when he had learned Barry’s tells like that one. 

 

They sit in silence for a while as Barry slowly works his way through the bowl of soup, but the quiet isn’t unfamiliar between the two of them. Fifteen minutes later Barry’s only finished half of the bowl, but he seems a little better when Taako takes it from him. He’s about to get up when Barry makes a little noise, leaning against him in a way that has Taako freezing up immediately, tensed up until, in a small voice, Barry asks, “Stay? For a minute?” and it’s not like Taako can say no to that, can he? So he stays, and Barry’s head becomes heavier on his shoulder until he’s snoring softly and Taako carefully lays him down and leaves, something twisted in his chest as he walks away.

 

***

 

Over the next few days, Taako makes every soup recipe he knows and quite a few from the other IPRE members’ childhoods that he’s never tasted before. He feels most successful when he recreates Barry’s favorite from his childhood that his mother used to make for him. Barry says it’s the best version he’s ever had and eats two whole bowls, asking for leftovers the next day. 

 

All in all, it’s a pretty chill week for Taako which is good, but also not, apparently, because with the time he’s been spending alone while Barry sleeps, Lup’s screams and the sinking feeling of despair and disinterest slowly creep back to him. And with no one to help him keep them away he spends hours taken by them, staring at nothing. 

 

Luckily, but the end of the week, Barry’s started to feel somewhat better and spends more time in the kitchen with Taako and often Magnus, sometimes Lucretia or Davenport. That helps, and Taako wonders when Barry took a place in the tiny circle that used to be just him and Lup because his presence more than anything is able to keep Taako afloat. There’s one day that’s really good, Barry’s doing great and even helps him make dinner for everyone. But by the next morning, it’s fallen apart. 

 

Apparently, Barry wasn’t quite as recovered as they all assumed because he doesn’t come out for breakfast that morning and when Taako goes to get him, the fever’s back full force and he looks absolutely miserable. Taako spends that day bouncing in and out of Barry’s cabin with water and tea as his skin gets hotter and hotter to the touch. By that night, Taako’s worried that the fever’s getting unsafely high and casts a cooling spell on him which seems to grant him a couple hours of respite as Barry sleeps and Taako watches over him worriedly, pressing cool towels against his forehead and neck when his temperature starts to rise again.

 

Barry wakes up when Taako’s standing over him and his eyes are glazed over and unfocused. He stares at Taako for a moment before his lips twitch upward and he blinks, voice rough as he says, 

 

“Lup.”  
  
Taako feels a lump in his throat which he attributes to the week spent without sleep in a slight depressive spiral, but he doesn’t correct him. Let the man have his fevered hallucinations, right?

 

“How ya feeling, Barold?” he asks and his voice is a little quiet and weak but Taako can’t bring himself to think about that too much when his sister’s boyfriend— _his_ _friend—_ is looking as rough as Barry is. 

 

“Like shit,” Barry answers but at least he isn’t coughing anymore. His eyes are closing again and Taako thinks he’s going back to sleep when Barry’s hand is grabbing onto his wrist and he speaks again. “Come on, stay with me.”  
  
Taako’s frozen for a moment, wondering if he should ignore it and go because he’s sure Barry will be asleep in a minute, or if he should listen and stay and maybe have to see the disappointment—maybe the disgust—on Barry's face when he wakes up in the morning and realizes it’s just him and not, in fact, his girlfriend. But Taako’s selfish and he’s tired and Barry seems so exhausted and miserable and before he knows it he’s crawling into bed next to him. As soon as he’s lying down, Barry’s arms are around him, pulling him against his chest and even for Taako who’s always run cold it’s like being in bed with a space heater but it’s also the first time he’s been hugged in eight months. And even Taako, who avoids physical contact from anyone but Lup, needs it and being held the way Barry’s holding him is almost too much and he has to squeeze his eyes shut, turn his face into Barry’s neck like he’s seen Lup do before, and remind himself how to breathe.

 

He must fall asleep—a tribute to how tired he had really been—because then he’s waking up and he’s still being held and he hates to admit to himself how nice it is. He understands now why Lup spends more nights with Barry than with him or by herself. 

 

He lays there for a moment, curled up against Barry’s chest, and realizes that he feels back to normal-human temperature. When Taako lifts his head up, he can see that the color is back to Barry’s face—and not the unnatural pinkness that had come with his fever. Upon realizing that Barry seems better, Taako feels a weight lift off his chest and breathes, closing his eyes and laying his head back down. After some amount of time, he hears Barry’s breathing change, signaling him waking up, and kind of holds his own breath and closes his eyes, bracing himself for Barry to be annoyed and make him leave and shatter the hesitant friendship they’ve built over the cycle that Taako almost definitely ruined by slipping into bed with him last night. 

 

But it doesn’t come. 

 

Barry is quiet for a few moments and Taako desperately wants to open his eyes and see his face to know what he’s thinking. Finally, Barry moves a little and instead of pushing Taako away, he pulls him a little closer and says, 

 

“Did I think you were Lup last night?”

 

Taako tenses a little in surprise because that really wasn’t the reaction he had been expecting. After a second, he relaxes and sort of allows himself to be held by the other, tucking his head under Barry’s chin again so he doesn’t have to look at him when he opens his eyes. 

 

“Yeah. You were pretty out of it.”

 

Barry chuckles and Taako can feel the sound vibrating in Barry’s neck against his forehead and in his chest against Taako’s arms that are curled up between their chests. 

 

“Yeah,” Barry answers, and they’re both quiet for a minute, Taako staring at some middle space over Barry’s shoulder, but it’s not like the staring he’d been doing during the week before, and for the first time since the encounter with the scorching spores, Taako feels completely here, and it’s a good feeling. Maybe it’s okay, he thinks, that he spent the night platonically with his sister’s boyfriend, even if it’s still incredibly weird. 

  
“Thanks for taking care of me,” Barry says, breaking the silence. His voice is so soft and still a little rough from the remnants of sleep and illness and it’s so _genuine_ and Taako was so afraid before that he can barely handle it, voice a little choked when he says,  
  
“No problem, my dude.”

 

***

 

No one mentions it when they walk into the kitchen together where their three remaining crew members are waiting for someone make breakfast, which Taako does while they all start talking to Barry, telling him how good it was to see him feeling better. 

 

That afternoon, Taako’s making cookies to have something to do and because he’s still feeling annoyingly fragile he’s making his favorite recipe tweaked just a little to be dairy-free for Barry’s sake. Barry’s at the table in the kitchen, reading something, but he looks up after they’ve been alone for some time. 

 

“Taako?”  


 

  
“Yeah?” he answers without moving from his mixing, though his ears do twitch upwards to indicate that he’s listening and he’s sure that’s enough for Barry, who has spent fifty years watching Lup, to know he’s paying attention.

 

“Are you doing okay?”  
  
Taako loses his concentration for a moment and pauses in his stirring, frowning just a little. “Uh. Yeah? Why do you ask, my man?”  
  
“Just…I know I was pretty out of it last week,” Barry starts and Taako can feel his eyes on his back. “But you kinda seemed that way too. Kinda off.” He pauses but continues when Taako doesn’t chime in. “I’ve noticed that you get like that sometimes, but…Lup is usually here to pull you out, you know?”

 

Taako adds the last ingredient to the mixture and wills his hand to stop shaking when he notices the slight tremors. He’s never really talked to anyone about it—even he and Lup had barely started talking about it when she just seemed to get it without needing anything else from him. He didn’t really think anyone would notice because, honestly the episodes were fewer and farther apart since joining the crew, but of course Barry would notice because Barry’s maybe the best out of all of them and Barry loves more than anyone else which Taako forgets sometimes so, yes, obviously, of course, he would notice. Especially now without Lup there to distract either of them.

 

“I know,” he confirms, back still turned to him as he finishes stirring. “It’s, uh. It’s not anything new,” he adds as he moves to grab a baking sheet. “It’s happened for…basically as long as I can remember. Started when we were kids, I guess.”

 

He glances at Barry after that and sees that he’s nodding, and Taako’s a little surprised when Barry doesn’t push him for more and instead says, “Well, uh. I know I’m not a great stand-in for her, but if you ever need someone, I’ll definitely do my best to help.”

 

Taako pauses for a second and looks at him. “You don’t have to worry about helping, Barry. You do,” he says in one of his most serious voices. Barry looks up and meets his eyes for a second, a bit of open-mouthed shock on his face, and nods, giving him a smile that Taako returns briefly. 

 

They don’t talk about it past that, but Taako does follow him to bed that night.

 

***

 

They get through the rest of cycle in this way, the three remaining months going about the same as the rest of the year save for Taako and Barry being even closer and spending almost every night together, even if Taako sometimes only stays a few hours. 

 

The Hunger comes, like always, and they don’t even try to fight it because they never figured out a safe way past those Scorching Spores so they don’t have the Light and they can’t fight back. They fly away knowing the plane will be destroyed and they will be reset and they honestly don’t feel that bad. The plane doesn’t have any people or civilizations that they found, so at least the universe isn’t taking too bad of a hit, and they’re all anxious to have Merle and Lup back and also to hopefully have some real food because most of the stuff they’ve eaten for the last month was transmuted—and not even from other food, mostly from non-natural things which never come out quite exactly right, no matter how good of a wizard Taako is. They’re ready for the new start. 

 

They’re all on deck as Dav flies them away, watching the black cylinders of Hunger take the plane apart, and Taako feels a moment of panic because what if this was it? What if they fly away and it doesn’t reset and Lup doesn’t come back. The despair is in his chest, suffocating him, and there’s nothing he can do because Lup is gone and he is alone he’s alone _he’s alone_ —

 

Someone grabs his hand and Taako looks over to see Barry standing next to him, smiling in that soft, comforting way he has and the bond engine flares as they leave the planar system, and as they enter the next he’s unraveled and then stitched back together a few feet away from his position and Lup is standing next to him. 

 

He’s moving almost before the atoms that make up his body are settled, tackling Lup nearly to the ground. Her familiar arms are around him instantly, holding him together as he takes a few shuddering breaths letting himself be held and comforted by her presence. It takes him a while to remember there are other people and step away from her, seeing the brilliant smile on her face. Then Barry’s there, smiling back with his hands held behind his back, obviously waiting his turn. 

 

“Hey, babe,” Lup says and Barry barely has time to give an answering, “Hey,” before they’re on top of each other, kissing like they haven’t seen each other in a year—which is true for half of them. Taako watches on for a minute before realizing he should feel weird about that—especially because now they’re just hugging each other and speaking softly and he’s about to go say hi to Merle or something when Barry says his name. He turns to look and two hands are reaching out to him and the weight of despair and disinterest on his chest isn’t gone but it’s lighter. It’s like the pit he’s in is shallower, maybe, and now he’s not alone because there are two hands coming from the top, reaching for him and extending longer than they should be able to to reach him and before he knows it, he’s being pulled out and into an embrace with his _two_ favorite people and the pit isn’t gone, really, but he’s got at least one foot out of it and even if he falls back in there are two people to help him now and he’s not alone. He’s not alone. 

 

_He’s not alone._

**Author's Note:**

> the idea of barry and taako bonding in a cycle where lup died grabbed me and wouldn't let me go until i wrote it, so i did. comments, kudos, and feedback are always appreciated! come hang out with me on tumblr if you want https://universaldarkwarrior.tumblr.com/


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